I visited a client recently, a large company with global operations and a large application delivery organization. A senior VP in charge of a large part of that organization told me an interesting story about its experience with a change in the way it approaches EA over the past few years. In brief, he said:

“A few years ago our architects were mostly dispersed into various parts of the delivery organization; we didn’t have an EA group.

“Then we recognized that we needed an EA group to better manage our use of technology, so we pulled those people out of delivery and formed them into an EA group.

“Since then EA has spent a lot of time understanding our business, building capability maps, and focusing on a more strategic level.

“But now I’m hearing cries of anguish from the delivery teams that they don’t have enough direct engagement and support from the architects in their delivery efforts. The delivery teams are concerned that EA has moved too far away from the actual delivery of business value, that EAs are not helping enough, and that it’s harming the effectiveness of the delivery organization.”